If I Should Die Before I Wake
by Broken-Mirror1
Summary: Kate saves Sawyer from drowning, but instead of being grateful, he seems even more angry and distant than before. What does this mean, and will she be able to bring back the old Sawyer? Set after finale.
1. Chapter 1

**IF I SHOULD DIE BEFORE I WAKE**

**Chapter 1**

Kate marched through the jungle, furious. How was it possible being such an ass? Did it just come natural to him? It had to.

She had no idea what his problem was. Lately he had seemed so distant, so… _cold_. It had been days since she had seen any of his cheeky grins, his bad jokes, or heard any of his insulting, but oddly fitting, nicknames. This wasn't Sawyer. It wasn't him at all.

Kate was on her way back to camp. She would do anything to get him talking, to get him open up to her; tell her what's wrong. She was tired seeing him like this; expressionless and quiet.

Kate slowed down as she saw light between the trees ahead of her. Soon she could see the beach. The first thing she saw was a big, blue van standing in the middle of all the tents. Quite a few of the tents were blown up and everything looked like a mess. Her eyes widened as she saw all the bodies lying there. Luckily, all of them were Others.

She slowly walked towards Hurley who was sitting cross-legged in the sand, staring out on the ocean. She carefully avoided stepping on the bodies, trying to avoid looking at them at the same time.

"Hey," she said and sat down with him, facing the ocean.

Hurley turned towards her, "Oh, hi Kate."

"So…" Kate started, "I heard you saved their asses out here."

Hurley chuckled proudly, "yeah, I kinda did." They sat in silence for awhile before Hurley said, "You came back alone? Where's Jack?"

Kate nodded, "It's only me. I wanted to check that everyone's…ok…" her voice trailed of as her eyes scanned the camp. Where _was_ he?

"He took of into the jungle a while ago," Hurley suddenly said after having observed her a minute.

"What? Who?"

"Sawyer."

"Oh, no, I wasn't – "she stuttered, "wait. Did you say he took of? Where'd he go?"

Hurley smiled and shrugged, "Dunno. He's been acting kinda glum lately, hasn't he? Maybe it's – "

Kate had gotten to her feet by this time; worry washed over her. He was out in the jungle… _alone_. It's probably full of Others, everyone hungry for revenge over the people they had lost.

"I um – I gotta go," she told Hurley in a hurry and walked up towards the jungle.

"Uhm, Kate?" Hurley called after her and she turned around. "That way dude." He pointed at the opposite way of were she was heading.

"Oh, thanks," she mumbled and changed the direction into where he was pointing.

_Thank God I know how to track, _she thought as she looked for prints and broken leaves and flat grass.

She followed what she hoped was him for a few kilometres. Then she stopped, confused. She had completely lost his tracks. She turned around and back again. "Damn," she breathed and looked around helplessly.

That was when she heard it; the beautiful sound of flowing water. She smiled a little to herself as she noticed where she was. Making an opening between two bushes the waterfall came in sight. _God_, she thought as she stared at it in awe, it seriously didn't seem like it was only three months since they had been there, fooling around. It had been fun, relaxing even. The stress of the plane crash seemed to go away, if only for five minutes. The bodies on the bottom had taken away some of the mood, though.

But she had to admit, fighting for the case had been _fun_. It wasn't at the time, but when she thought back it was. That fun, sarcastic, cocky Sawyer was better than the moody, short-tempered and pessimistic one she had to live with nowadays.

Then her eyes caught a pair of shoes lying near the water edge. She had to laugh and she shook her head in the relief. He had merely taken a swim. And here she was thinking a could be dead in the hands of the Others.

She scanned the water. She couldn't see him anywhere. And then, with a shock as big as if someone had dropped a big can of ice-cold water over her, she saw something floating in the water. Or rather; some_one. _

He was lying face-down, his blond hair in a mess around his head.

'_Sawyer_!'

Kate didn't hesitate on ripping of her shoes. She was in the water almost before she had gotten them of completely. She swam as if her life depended on it. Actually, life _did _depend on it.

She hoped it wasn't too late. _Please, don't let it be too late. _

She reached him and grabbed his head and turned his body around. He was limp and slowly started to sink. Hot tears burned in her eyes as she started to swim backwards, dragging him with her.

Finally, up on shore she laid him down. She pressed her ear against his open mouth. "No, no, no, no!" There was no breathing sound. "Don't be dead," she whispered, her voice merely a whimper. "Please don't be dead," she begged softly.

Holding two fingers over his nose she bowed down and emptied her lungs into his. She placed her hands on his chest, "one, two, three – "she counted. How many times were you supposed to do this?

"Come on, come _on_."

After repeating this five times Kate cried out in pain and frustration. "Don't you die on me, Sawyer," she said through gritted teeth, tears streaming down her cheeks, "don't you _dare_ die on me!"

But screaming to him didn't help, she knew that. She got up and backed away slowly, her hands pressed over her trembling mouth.

She stood there, in shock for about thirty seconds before she decided to pull herself together. She vaguely remembered when she and Jack had found Charlie hanging by the neck, appearing dead. Jack had immediately known what to do, she had felt completely useless, she had not had known what to do if she had found him there alone. She would have panicked. She gave up on Charlie when the CPR didn't work, but Jack hadn't. She didn't even want to think about what would have happened if Jack had given up on Charlie too, he would have died. She couldn't give up on Sawyer, not yet. Not before she'd tried everything possible.

So she sat down beside him, raised her fist, trembling violently. Then she brought it down with as much force she could muster. She did it again, and then again. Feeling worse and worse about it. _What if it was too late? This seem so wrong… _

Each time her fist connected to him a sob forced its way out of her, making her chest ache horribly.

But no matter how hard she hit or how many times, nothing happened. Her body felt numb as she backed away from him. Her head was filled with a weird buzzing sound and she couldn't even cry.

She turned around slowly, trying to take it all in. He was gone… forever. _He had left her._ She was about to sink down to her knees and scream when she suddenly tensed, hearing something. A spluttering sound followed by …coughs? No, it couldn't be… he was dead, she couldn't save him… Kate spun around and what she saw almost made her cry out in relief.

She cried and laughed at the same time as Sawyer struggled to get the water out of his lungs. Kate hurried over to him, kneeling beside him. She supported his back as he tried to sit up, hitting him softly behind the shoulder blades to help him get the water out.

"It's okay, you're alright," she soothed, "just get it out."

They stayed like that for a few minutes so Sawyer could catch his breath. Their position reminded Kate about the time Sawyer had got shot and was lying in the hatch; she had been scared, yes. But that was nothing to how she had just felt.

"What happened?" Sawyer suddenly croaked and Kate smiled at the sound of his voice.

"I found you in the water," she said, "I thought you were dead."

"Well, don't waste your tears, Kate, I'm alive ain't I?" was it just her or did it sound like he wasn't happy about being alive? He loosened himself from her protective grip and got to his feet, a little shakily.

Frustration washed over her again. Kate. _Kate_?! What had she done wrong now? She had saved him hadn't she?

"Ok, what the hell's wrong with you?" Kate said, her hands planted on her hips.

Sawyer didn't look at her, "just - let's just get back to camp."

**Authors Note:** A big hug to the wonderful _SassyLostie_ for being my beta. Love you, hun!

As for the chapter; please review and make my day. I will continue this if I get over 3 reviews (see? I don't crave much)


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: **Sorry for the ridiculously long wait for this chapter everyone, but I haven't been home and when I got home I didn't have any inspiration. But now it's here, and the next will come sooner than this did.

**Disclaimer:** I wouldn't be writing this if I owned even the slightest piece of LOST.

**Chapter 2**

Kate sat by the fire, poking around the ashes with a stick. Sawyer had ignored her ever since the incident a few hours ago. He hadn't even said 'thank you' or given her any reason to be proud of her actions… he hadn't even looked in her direction.

Kate figured he could be in some kind of shock after the accident, but… he had been like this_ before_ it happened too. Something was up with him, and whatever it was, she didn't like it.

Could it be he was acting like this, especially towards her, because there was a chance she could be pregnant? He had made it very clear to her what his opinion about that was, and Kate silently agreed. Getting pregnant was _not _what she needed right now.

She sighed and glanced towards his tent. The flaps were shut, but Kate had a feeling he were not asleep. Why, she wasn't sure.

She threw the stick into the flames that greedily devoured it. Kate watched for a few seconds, she felt like the flickering of the flames were hypnotizing her somehow. She tore her gaze away, and instead, set it upon his tent. Finally, she got up and began towards it; she had had enough of this.

Kate wrapped her arms around herself as a chilly wind hit her on her bare arms, the safe light from the fire was no longer near her, only darkness surrendered her now.

She reached his tent and wondered if she should knock. But to knock on a tent flap didn't make much sense to her so instead she decided to reveal her presence otherwise.

"Sawyer?" she asked softly.

And as she had expected there came no answer.

"Sawyer?" she asked again. "You in there?" she waited a few seconds. "James?"

Still no sound.

"Come on," she said impatiently, "I know you're in there."

She waited, but he still didn't answer her. She sighed in frustration and for one second she wanted to rip the tent-flap open and just walk right in, but changed her mind. If this was the way he wanted it, she sure as hell wouldn't stand in his way.

"You're unbelievable, you know that?" she said, "you know…" she hesitated before continuing, "maybe I shouldn't have saved you at all; maybe I should have just -" she swallowed and didn't finish the sentence. She shook her head as she walked away.

Inside the tent Sawyer had been listening carefully, and was now nodding his agreement. "Maybe you should've."

"Hey,"

Kate turned her head towards the source of the voice, "Hi." She said and smiled weekly.

"You okay?" Jack asked as he sat down beside her.

"Yeah," Kate said and tried to keep her voice as close to normal as she could, she didn't want him to know she had been crying. "I'm fine."

"You don't look fine."

"I'm _fine_, Jack. I'm just tired… didn't get much sleep last night."

Jack nodded, "I know what you mean. I don't think a lot of us have slept that well lately"

Jack's voice toned out as Kate unconsciously looked towards Sawyer's tent. If she only knew what was up with him… something was clearly wrong.

Jack looked between her and the tent, "this about Sawyer?" he asked.

"What?" Kate blinked, not really listening, "oh, no, it's not."

Jack didn't look convinced.

"Okay, maybe a little… and everything else; Locke changing sides, Naomi, and Charlie and Desmond's still not back – "

Jack sighed, "I'm sure Charlie and Desmond are fine."

Now it was Kate's turn to sigh, "I'm not so sure… I mean, they've obviously turned the switch, so why aren't they back by now?"

"I don't know."

_If only Locke were here_, Kate thought as she once again glanced towards Sawyer's tent. Then she could've asked him what happened out there. Because it was since he had been out with Locke he changed. Something happened on that trip, she was sure of it.

Jack looked at Kate again who again was lost in thoughts while staring at Sawyers tent, frowning. "I'll leave you to it, then." He said and got up.

"Yeah, bye." Kate said distracted, still thinking about Sawyer and Locke, and whether or not something had happened while they were out doing, whatever it was they had been doing, together.

Jack brushed sand from his jeans, and with a last look at Kate, walked back to the fire where some of the others sat.

Kate sighed and she too got up, brushed sand off of her jeans and slowly walked towards her own tent. There she lay down on her make-shift bed. As she laid there, inside the cool and dark tent, her thoughts started going in another direction, as she fell asleep her dreams were filled with the sound of running water and muffled screams.

Kate sat up abruptly, panting. At first she didn't remember her dream. But then, slowly and blurry, it came to her.

"Oh, my God," she whispered.


End file.
